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I attend Arcadia University, a reputable school known for their global studies and physical therapy. I am currently working on receiving my masters in International Peace and Conflict Resolution, my time in South Korea really helped shape that perspective.

I completed my first year, and so far I have so many opinions and ideas about grad school, I’m not sure if I should speak on those feelings just quite yet, some of my thoughts are premature. I can however say that first semester was a breeze but time management was a challenge. I was working full time at a Title company and attending school full time with 3 classes. If I had to do it all over again I’m not sure I would, I missed out on a lot of things due to my obligations at work, I was very tired and most days MOODY. Second semester whooped my ass for sure. Second semester was a little different, I quit my full time job, and decided to take 4 classes while working as a graduate assistant. I worked at the library as a Inter-Library Loan assistant, it was only 6hrs a week so no biggy, plus I learned how to properly capture and search for books, articles, and excerpts. One of the many challenges for researches: WORDING. But my boss made sure to teach me that OVER &OVER!

So a brief summary of my program: International Peace and Conflict Resolution. First let me start by saying NO I don’t want to be a diplomat or work for the UN (side eye for people who ALWAYS say that to me) Second, Peace as you know it, is not what peace really is or how they taught you back in grade school where it’s this Utopia or community where everyone holds hands and loves each other. That description depicts a life that is perfect bliss. You should be wise enough to know there is no such thing as perfect. We all argue, we all have disagreements; we have conflicts with one another. The different theories of conflict and the different theories of resolutions are the basics of what I study. Then there are different tiers that fall under conflict, and resolution I fit in on the resolution side, I’m particularly specializing in sustainable development post conflict. I will definitely dig into this more in a later post when I talk about my internship.

Overall this program has helped me thus far within my professional life, and my personal life. I deal with conflict differently, I see conflict differently and my communication skills have deeply benefited. I’ve met some interesting people in my program some of whom I will definitely see later on as I develop.

So it dawned on me today that I’m half way complete with my internship and I have yet to post my outfits. It’s not because I’m lazy or not dedicated… but believe it or not I don’t have a tripod … Continue reading →

So if you’ve followed me from the past, then you know I had been waiting to gain acceptance to a graduate program: International Peace and Conflict Resolution @ Arcadia University. Well….. round of applause. Because since we last chatted I have gained acceptance into the program, and I have officially completed my first year– ALIVE!!!!! I will definitely get more into that in another post, but for now I would like to get into a new segment I would like to introduce to the blog which is Internship Graduate Style. So I have taken a challenge…I love clothes, I have an affinity for them, and after moving to Chicago for my internship I realized I have TOO many clothes. It is so excessive it makes absolutely no sense. I mean don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with having an abundance of fashionable clothes but after sooooo many– really whats the point!?

So the challenge is:

I cannot buy new clothes

I have to wear everything at least once

If there are items I don’t absolutely adore I must throw them out or if they get stained (to make room for next year of course!)

The sections will be split up into two categories:

Internship Ready!
Out-of-Office Wear

This is just a way for you to see how you can look polished, and office appropriate. Some office outfits I see are just horrendous, and it makes me wonder…

So check back often as I will be posting weekly. This is going to be a hard challenge, I love clothes.

So as of now I am 3 years and 3months post big chop off (please go back and read the post if your are new) anyhow this hair now has its own entity. People literally stop me to either compliment my hair or to ask questions like: How do you get your hair to look like that? At this point I’m so over it I thought you know what I’m going to direct them to my blog and if their truly interested they will seek this wonderful information that is out there for anyone to get. Time is money, and the people that are usually asking me these questions see I’m on that good stroll. Answering a loaded question about my hair will at the very least take me 15-20mins, and that’s only if you know the natural hair terminologies, and hair products. So this introduces me to my new section Fro 3.0, I have always talked about my hair on this blog. But this time I will show hairstyles, products that are currently working for ME, and I may even do a couple vids…*gasp*

I kid you not I get stopped. Check out these two posts I was in, they are from the same day while at the Roots Picnic 2013!!!

It has been a long time since I have made love to my beautiful blog. I have taken some time since I last logged my thoughts–so much has changed so many things have happened. Will I ever catch my faithful readers up on what has changed??? Probably not! but I will certainly try.

I will be back full time, I will do things a little different– more organized, more risks,more purpose, and some BIG news, Until then bear with me it will be worth it i promise!

I just wanted to say that I will no longer blog. At first I loved the idea of blogging, I thought hey ‘I will just start tracking my thoughts and travels’ but now— im just really fed up with technology and how accessible I am to people from the world-wide web. I like the aspect of free writing meaning, anything I want to say I say (cursing words allowed) .

What im trying to say is, this blogging business is not fun for me anymore. I much rather move into doing something in Publisher for my own pleasure.

My last post will be about my hair My one year choppiversary…if you been with me from the beginning you will remember I came home from work one day and cut my relaxed ends off. Well one year later and my hair is a BAA(big ass afro) I can’t believe how fast its grown . 8(>_<)8

So money- money- money -money has been on my mind for years now, I’m not talking about yearly salary kind of money I’m talking about my net worth..kinda money. Ever since I was little I always heard my parents say they were broke, anytime I wanted to take a trip or do something the answer was NO were broke. It wasnt until I got older did I realize my parents were never broke they just said NO in order to keep ample cash flow amongst a family of six.

Then theirs my BFF she graduated with a finance degree, and since freshman year when we were roomies I would watch her always budget right down to the .86cents she spent on candy. I would look at her crazy because every day she would be balancing her checkbook—later when we became roomies after graduation she would budget like once a week and she would spend like and hour doing so. I always admired her diligence, but I never thought to ask her questions about her strategies, I knew she had a formula but I always just brushed it off like “i’m not savvy enough to learn it” and “numbers scare me and im bad at math.”

Well now 4years later and i’m just not really satisfied with how I spend, budget, and save my money. A light bulb went off in my head that said this is the time to learn about acquiring wealth and being smart about investment choices (blame the OWN network, if you dont know what that is, it’s oprahs new network)

I called my BFF and asked her what book she suggested for a 26year old that’s possibly about to go back to graduate school she suggested:

Smart women finish rich by: David Bach

I am a firm believer that knowledge is the most empowering gift you can give to someone. So I will briefly highlight some of the bullet points I took away. I suggest you do your own financial research, this book is a good start whether you are a man or women.

What determines your wealth is not how much you make but how much you keep, of what you make.

Fair or not women need to do more financial planning than a man

Inflation is still public enemy #1

No matter how much or how little you earn whenever you make any money before you spend any of it you should put away a little for yourself–in the book this is referred to as the latte factor. How to create massive wealth on just a few dollars a week.

Know what you earn: I currently earn $_____a month before taxes, and $_____ after taxes

Estimate what you spend each month

If you work for a company that offers a 401(k) that matches open up an account, if you dont inevitably your throwing away free money(this is something I always knew but it never registered until NOW when they said it was free money I was turning down if I didnt join– I wanted to bang my head on a wall thinking about all the money I could have saved up by now had I joined. All my past jobs offered a 401(k) and matched)

Those are just a few tips I have a lot of work to do because these key points come with goals and charts I must fill out to keep me on track and focused on the “big picture”

The next book I’m reading is: The money book for the young fabulous & broke by Suze Orman

Now I like Suze Orman but I dont really like her style of writing, when it comes to sharing information I understand her books are geared more towards my generation but everything doesnt always have to be a story. I can deal without the stories, just give me the cold hard facts followed up with concrete examples.

The reason why I picked up this book is to become more informed about my student loans, I paid off one. But the rest i’m clueless as to what to do and where to begin??

The added bonus was the section about investing made easy. She broke it down as follows:

The best funds for your 401(k) and Roth IRA

Diversifying your risk

Dollar cost averaging

As quoted by Suze “I know this subject is serious stuff. your future is riding on it. But taking control of your financial life doesnt need to be a solitary and scary process. Fear comes from not knowing what to do or how to do it. And when we are fearful, we do nothing.”

I encourage you all to educate yourself so that the cycle of debt doesnt continue.

I received the best e-mail of my life just take a look. As you may know im applying to grad school, I been in contact with one of my professors for a long time trying to politely get him to write a letter of rec. I can finally rest assure that my application has been completely, and successfully submitted!!! I wasnt stressed but im one of those people who hate doing things up until the last-minute.

So every now and again I get these urges to do something– I dunno RANDOM, with a mix of pain—a few years back I had my Monroe pierced and took it out due to entering corporate world. Well the opportunity came a knocking and I re-pierecd my Monroe. Nobody wanted me to get it done but hey don’t forget yours truly is ms solo dolo……….. so introducing my new addition

These were taken a few weeks ago and these are my gurls from high school, we had a mini reunion—years later and we are EXACTLY the same as when we were in high school just more mature.

This is a star shot picture of jade and I. This picture was taken back in High school… yes folks this was me Senior year in high school hahaha. This was the hottest thing to do back in the day, have pics taken with your BFF’s

Let me tell you all something I went through a real emotional rollercoaster–this is something that I can not describe because even when it was described to me it didnt come close to any of those words. On a scale from 1-10 of how painful it was to transition back to civilian life I would say it was a 100! Literally the moment I landed on US soil I felt like I had made a huge mistake and I wanted to go back….. WTF!?!?! Then I couldnt sleep, I was a walking ZOMBIE for about 2 straight weeks::::the second day back I broke out into random bouts of tears, like full on im boohoo. Again WTF?!?!? I didnt want to see anybody while in cali the only person I saw was my homegirl Kaloni and my other homegirl Vay people that looked out for me you know….so I hid from the world, it was just too much—way too much stimulation.

That same week I returned Saturday I took off to the Dirty Dirty south to see my second sister we did a road trip to see my first sister who lives in DC–madness I know but it was all for a good cause–grad school. So I was just visiting mad friends that I hadn’t seen since before I left–

I went to visit my university from Undergrad to see my professors::pretty much beg them for letters of recs–the one professor I was scared to see ended up giving me the best letter of recommendation I have ever seen!!!! (lets just say he was one of my challenging professors that can smell bullshit lightyears away, so you have NO choice but to come correct in his classes!!!) anyways I couldnt have been more thankful, it was meant to happen that way–considering 2 of my professors no longer worked there (heartbreaking).

We then made our way to DC so we could spend thanksgiving and my birthday up there!!! Oh yea everybody my birthday passed hahaah first time in my life where my birthday really wasnt a big deal to me—for my birthday I met the creator of the Zuresh product line so I will have to do an update post of all the sweet things I bought from her OMG let me just say::::HEAVEN!!!!! We ate at this spanish restaurant but on the way there I passed out in the car for a quick Zombie nap. Out of nowhere I just woke up like a Dracula or something. My sisters were like What the heck is wrong with you!?!?! After I awoke I walked across the street to best buy to purchase Kanyeeeezy CD (yeeezy taught me) and then had dinner it was a good night(sorry the pics of the dinner got deleted)

but here are some highlights of my road trip

First on the list stone soup kitchen and my best bud:

This chai tea has haunted me many nights

my homboys do music now so i laid down a quick 16bars it will never see the light of day!!

Chillin with fam for the holidays in DC, can I just say I love the vibe of DC!!(my sisters townhouse is the the bizness)

Jorge and I, I was about to fight

mmmmmm jamaican food *drool*

My birthday

playing with my older sisters antique phone

fresh flowers

Donette, my second sister took me on a 4hour mission to see the lincoln memorial—my hands froze and I was pissed at her for making us walk like 10miles but it was worth it.

We then made our way to NYC to visit my aunt in BROOKLYN!!! My third Home.

my sister just had to be a tourist

Headed to Philly philly to visit my grad school, sat in on a class and spoke with the director of the department International Peace and Conflict Resolution. Looking good folks wish me luck on acceptance–after I visited the other half of the 3Musketeers and her baby in New Jersey.

Just like old times

My lil god-daughter

Came back full circle to ATL to see my right hand man Eboni before I took off